Lara I.

I guess because of the election my work was really busy. It was a really hectic day all day and didn't let up until the very end of the night. I spent almost nine hours taking names and calling names, being the coordinator. It's kind of monotonous - I just stand behind the podium and tell people how long the wait is (and they argue with me nine out of ten times. It's rare that I say a time and they just say, okay) and I listen over the headset for what tables are open and call names accordingly, and then call for other hosts over the headset to come take people to their seats.

And I get so much shit - like I said, people argue with me non-stop. I say the wait is forty-five minutes, and sure enough the person I'm talking to says to me "oh it's not really that long, it'll be shorter than that, won't it?" Well, no, it won't, or I would have said so, but, see, they're trying to trick me, they're trying to get me to say, well, maybe it will be shorter, so then they can say that it took too long for them to be seated and they want to eat for free. Or I get people who say, well, what about the smoking section? Is that a shorter wait? (There is no smoking in the whole building...) Well, we'll take a table, what's the wait for a table? (As opposed to what, exactly? The floor?) Well, I have children. (Okay, here are some crayons... seriously, you think because you're out with your kids and they're hard to control, you don't have to wait in line?) Well, I'm here with my elderly parents, they don't really have to wait, do they? My father can't stand here in the lobby, he's old, blah blah blah - SORRY, BUT, you STILL HAVE TO WAIT. I don't CARE what your story is. I cannot just snap my fingers and produce a vacant table for you, and I certainly am not bumping you in front of every other person who has been sitting here staring me down from the minute I told THEM how long the wait is.

( And I get shit from my coworkers, too. )

And I'm so sick of that job anyway I just want to scream.

Well, I apologized to Erica today.

I don't know what's the matter with me sometimes. On the one hand, I feel like I should just be able to say, hey, that's the way I am, that's how I act, I am moody, I am angry, and I am often completely irrational, and you know, that's just the way I am so you just have to deal with it. But should "that's just the way I am" really be an excuse for bad behavior?

I guess what I'm really saying is that I really hate the attitude of "well that's who I am so I can't help it that I treat you that way." And I hate that as much as I try to be different, that is the way I am. Clearly, it is.

And you know, this upset me more than it upset her. She was really to let the whole thing just blow over - because she's already caught on to the fact that this is just "they way I am."

I TAKE A FUCKING PILL NOT TO BE THIS WAY!

What the hell would I be like without it? Or is it not working anymore? Ah, I've got it, I've built up a resistance to it! That would make sense, that would sure fit the pattern, now, wouldn't it?

Why did I have to be wired COMPLETELY FUCKING BATSHIT?

I can't talk about this anymore. I need to storm off. I need to slam some doors. I need to break something. A few things. I need to fly off the handle again. I can feel it brewing - and it won't make me feel better. It won't change a FUCKING thing.

Yes, as you can tell I am very mature.

One day, perhaps, I will get over my amusement with switching the hyphen from before "ass" to after it.

Today is not that day.

( Long-ass entry, my friends, for I have a lot to say. )

So now I can accuse Bevan of making me sick.

Or, I have made him sick.

Either way. Sick sucks.

And thats... what's been up.

Yep.

So, you may have noticed I've been conspicuously missing from your flists.

No you haven't. But now that I mentioned it perhaps you do recall that I haven't been around for a few days :P

I have been being social and stuff. It's been a blast. I have a lot to say. LOTS.

Of course nothing is perfect. And before you click the cut and skip to the end, NO, nothing has changed in regards to the previous entry. I am still wallowing in mountains of sexual frustration.

( But aside from that, other things have been going on. I think I lose at friends, for one thing. )

I try very hard to be happy. I take a pill for that. But I'm just always so fucking lonely. I would like not to be lonely but... sometimes I feel like my brain is just stuck that way or something. How can I be lonely at Matt's place, with Matt right there? How can I be lonely in Bevan's car, with him right there with me?

It's hard to just go for what you want most when you don't even know what it is you want to begin with, isn't it?

But I did have a very good time. And I'm back now, home, here, whatever. Still the same person. Still the same everything.

I don't like my parents.

They didn't abuse me. I just don't like them.

I also don't like people who make me feel like such a defective person that obviously something must have been done to me in my childhood to make me act the way I do.

I guess I'm just not a nice person, okay? Not everyone is.

Today I had an appointment with my shrink. Getting there was another bus adventure. The actual appointment was completely uneventful. I think he is my favoritest shrink ever - he doesn't give a rat's ass about me. He doesn't remember anything about me. He doesn't look at my file. He just asks if I want to change my medication. I don't.

Ok, so, to recap: if my own psychiatrist is not interested in my childhood... right. You'd be gaining no insight to question me about mine.

You know, I think I just might take certain comments a little bit to personally every now and then.

You want to know what happened to me at work today?

Well, it was my last day at the Coffee Co, that's what.

I got to work, went inside, and Kiva (my manager) said Renee (the owner, and my manager at the other store) was there and needed to talk to me. I was like, uh, okay, whatever, and Renee gave me this little prepared speech about how I can't just pick and choose when I want to work, if I'm scheduled to work I need to come in or get my shift covered, and that "reliability has been a problem" with me and not showing up yesterday was the icing on the cake, and I can consider myself officially no longer an employee of the Coffee Co.

I call bullshit. Reliability has never "been an issue" with me. There have been three times, in the year and a half I've worked for her, that I haven't come to work. One, when I had to go to court. Two, I missed three days and I had a doctor's note, and three, yesterday. And as for yesterday, I said specifically to Kiva on Monday, "if I stay today, I am not coming in tomorrow." She did not say "if you don't come in tomorrow, you're fired." And lets not forget the reason I had to stay so late on Monday was because other people called out at the last minute. And then there are all those times Shaina called out the morning of her shift because she wanted to take her kids to the park or some shit like that. I am not unreliable. I have never heard of a job where only one employee is never allowed to take days off, never allowed to call in sick, never allowed to have a vacation or whatever. Other people do it all the time, I, for some reason, am always required to cover for people who are taking days off, and have never been allowed to take a day off myself. I was also hired with the understanding that I had the five am shift until a new person was hired - three new people were hired and I never got off the five am shift. When I "got moved" to the other store, to which I had no transportation to, I also had the five am shift every day. Everyone else rotated, they each got one five am shift a week. I got one every day. Kiva said it was because Renee told her those are the shifts I wanted. Which is bullshit, of course - my second job is at night, why would I want a five am shift? They trolley doesn't start running until seven, why would I want a five am shift?

( And the really messed up thing is, I LIKED that job. )

And now I'm home. And I'm still kind of stunned about getting fired. I've never gotten fired before, ever. And I really want to know what happened to all those people who called out on Monday and made me have to stay so late - I bet you anything they still have jobs. Not really sure what I'm going to do about money. I'm not going to make enough. I should be more worried than I actually am, I think. Maybe it just hasn't sunk in yet or something.

Shit, shit, shit, and also shit as well.

Been wanting to write about stuff. BS going on at work. BS going on at bars after work. BS associated with my house and zoning laws and the like. Do some memes. Speculate about the season finale of Doctor Who (I, unlike others, liked the most recent episode, by the way.)

NOT RIGHT NOW.

Right now I have a very, very big problem.

It seems my parents have claimed me as their dependent on their '07 taxes.

So. I filed as a single, independent person for '07. I have never actually done my own taxes before - I've either not kept a job long enough or made enough to have to file, just flat out didn't file when I definitely should have, or my parents did my taxes because they were claiming me as their dependent. I filed this year because I'm trying to be grown up and responsible, and also I have property taxes, and that's a little more hard-core than being taxed on a minimum wage part time job earnings, so I figured I'd better do it.

They can't claim me as their dependent. They used to, when I was in college (and I use the term "in college" loosely - I did exactly two full time semesters in... five, four, six, however many years it was...) because they were calling me a full-time student, even though I usually wasn't really; even if I registered for a full time class load at the beginning of the semester I usually dropped a few classes. But legally you can claim your adult child if they're a full time college student and younger than twenty six.

Being that I'm not a student, they can't claim me.

But, see, I'm thinking they thought they could claim me because I'm disabled. Legally? Yeah, you can claim your adult disabled child as your dependent. BUT TO DO THAT YOU HAVE TO ACTUALLY SUPPORT THEM.

My parents do not support me. My parents and I have not spoken one word for the entirety of 2007. Not one. I didn't set foot in their house, and they didn't send me one cent. They didn't support me, and they can't claim me.

Wtf do I do?

I want to just call my mom and scream at her, like, wtf were you thinking? But that would mean, you know, calling my mom. Which would give her my phone number, which she doesn't have right now, and I like it that way. This would be forcing open the door of communication, when I'm perfectly happy with it being shut.

So... they're banking in the fact that I won't contact them about this and will just suck it up and deal with it, because they know I'm not going to be the first one to break this utter silence? Or what?

I can re-do my taxes, re-file, pay the penalty, whatever, and be done with it. BUT I AM SO FUCKING PISSED OFF, how dare they?

This is me shaking my head in disgust. I am so fucking furious right now. Absofuckinglutely furious.

So I got written up at work (restaurant) for not coming in the other night.

Which totally wasn't my fault.

I hate that shit. I hate having to rely on other people to drive me around. And I hate getting in trouble. I hate trying to make excuses for why I did something wrong - I did something wrong, I didn't come in to work and didn't call until about a half hour before my shift started. So yes, of course I'm in the wrong, even though it wasn't my fault, and I still feel all pissed and defensive and just generally shitty about it. I hate getting in trouble. I was the kid who cried when she got her name put on the board in elementary school. Seriously.

So now I've been written up at the coffee co for being on my phone behind the counter, and written up at the restaurant for not showing up for my shift. When the only reason I was on the phone in the first place was because Renee wouldn't let me leave, even though I wasn't even supposed to be working in the first place, and I missed my ride to my other job and I was calling to tell them why I wasn't there.

Why am I completely unable to be a regular old reliable person? Why must I constantly screw everything up? These are simple jobs - an idiot should be able to do them with their eyes closed. And yet I manage to get written up by both of them.

How bad is it, really, to drive a car with expired registration and no insurance with a suspended license?

...ok typing it all out like that, well, I don't really have to ask. I know it's really bad.

I should just sell the damn thing and be done with it.

So, this morning at work I finally got myself to speak to Renee about my hours. I really didn't know how the conversation was going to go because I had no idea what she was going to say to me and I still don't really understand what her problem with me is in the first place. I've been a good employee. I do everything I'm supposed to do. So I don't understand why she can't treat me decently. But she really hasn't been. And it's been before I missed those days from work and she cut my hours down to two hours a day. She just watches me like she's waiting for me to do something wrong, and gets on my case about every single thing, and it's unnerving, because I know I'm already doing everything right to begin with, but she will sometimes accuse me of doing stuff I didn't do, and sit me down for a talk about it, and stuff like that.

So the big explanation for cutting my hours like that? Oh just that she's going to "use me in the other store when it opens." That's just how she said it, don't worry about your hours, I'm going to use you in the other store. Meaning, at the other store, I'll get plenty of hours, and just wait till it opens up, but see... I DONT WANT TO WORK AT THE OTHER STORE!

Nobody wants to go work at the other store. We all work at the store in town because that's where we want to work. She can hire anyone she wants to go work on the boardwalk store - it's not exactly hard to find summer help. There are gonna be plenty of high school kids wanting jobs for the summer and stuff, not to mention the kids who spend the whole summer here cause their parents have shore homes. I don't know, I never worked at the boardwalk store, but to hear everyone else talk about it, it sucks because the customers are all rude self entitled tourists instead of the people who come in who, you know, live and work here.

But I specifically do not want to work at the boardwalk store cause it's over twenty blocks away and I told her that. And she said she only hires people who can drive, so she can be sure reliability won't be a problem, and when she hired me I could drive and I should have known I could have been scheduled at the other store and blah blah blah. Now, I did assure her when I got hired I would always be able to go to work. But I had a driver's license then. And besides that, I only live a few blocks away, so getting to work hasn't been a problem. But it's about to become one! Twenty blocks? I don't know if I have the energy for that every morning... and, damnit, even if there was nothing wrong with my shoulder I think doing that twice a day would probably cause some kind of problem - I know Renee's been getting on my case a lot for a while but I really feel like all this started when I missed work because of my shoulder.

I guess I really didn't have to stay home, is what it comes down to. The doctor told me to, but you know, he didn't really listen to me when I explained to him where I work and what I do there. He just made the generic statement, stay home from work and don't do anything strenuous for the next few days. I could have gone to work. I don't do anything strenuous there. Of course, I'd have to walk there, and really, that's what I was trying to avoid, cause that's what I think makes my shoulder hurt so much, but if I could have just walked there those three days, then I wouldn't have to worry about walking twenty blocks to the other store.

I should just quit and get a new job lined up for summer.

But I like being a barista. That's like, my thing. That's my hip-cool non-conformist-type unskilled labor job, my I-don't-feel-so-bad-about-not-having-a-real-job cause my job is a cool job job.

So today at work I told Shaina off in a fit of rage.

Really, I don't normally get like that. And it was hardly eloquent. I've had so many things I've wanted to bite her head off about that I've been saving up for something spectacular, but it really wasn't all that spectacular. In fact, I'm sure I looked like a complete idiot. And a half.

But I can't stand the way she talks to me, like she has this fabulous life and of course I have a fabulous life too - oh, you're not feeling well? Go get a check-up! Go to the medical center in Princeton, they're so wonderful there, oh, you should see doctor so-and-so, he did blah blah blah for me last year when I had this health problem that has nothing at all to do with yours, so you'll call up, and you'll tell them I told you to call, and use my maiden name, not my married name, you know, because my parents are soooo important, blah blah blah -

( Again, got long so I cut this )

Why do I have to be such a fucking mess? Why can I not get a handle on myself? Why do I let a forty-year-old woman who never grew out of the my-daddy-says-I'm-a-little-princess phase of life get under my skin like that? What kind of twenty-four-year-old throws a tantrum at her little coffee-shop McJob?

I could be all like, wah, wah, I didn't feel good, I was in pain, I was overmedicated, whatever, but I don't take excuses from other people so since when should I start taking them from myself?

Control, Lara. Get some of that before you leave the house again.